An air mass sensor is usually used in an internal combustion sensor to determine the air mass supplied to the internal combustion engine and consumed during combustion. To be able to determine and influence the pollutant emissions of the internal combustion engine, knowledge of the air/fuel mixture which is supplied to the individual cylinders is required. Furthermore, the pressure prevailing in the cylinders is a significant auxiliary factor contributing to the ability to predict the type and quantity of emissions from the internal combustion engine. The air mass flow of an internal combustion engine is currently only known as an average value across all cylinders of the internal combustion engine, if an individual air mass sensor is not used per cylinder. The use of an individual air mass sensor per cylinder is however cost-intensive and is thus not suited to the mass production of motor vehicles within the mid-range price segment.
It is however generally known that tolerances in the cylinder geometry and differences in the compression rates of the individual cylinders leads to inaccurate information relating to the actual air mass supplied to the individual cylinders. It is also not possible to deduce accurately from this information which pressure ratios actually prevail in each individual cylinder. This incomplete information automatically results in inaccurate knowledge relating to the combustion and the air/fuel mixture taking place.
As a result of the above situation, the disadvantage emerges that the specific conditions in the individual cylinders of an internal combustion engine are not known in order to reduce the pollutant emissions of the internal combustion engine.